School Library Systems - Advocacy Toolkit
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Testimony Samples
- School Libraries and School Library Systems - Instrumentalities Of Learning
- Testimony Presented To The New York State Commission
On Education Reform
Presented by Linda Fox, School Library System Director, Capital Region BOCES
Tuesday, January 13, 2004
Empire State Plaza, Albany
Hello. My name is Linda Fox and I speak to you as a School Library System Director from the Capital Region of New York State. The School Library System is a state-funded resource-sharing network involving libraries statewide. It offers students, teachers and administrators equal access to print and non-print resources. Almost all schools in New York State, public and private, are members of a school library system. New York State has been ordered by our highest Court to ensure that "every school has the resources necessary for providing the opportunity for a sound basic education". I am here to urge you today to recommend to the Governor and the Legislature to begin to make that a reality in New York City and New York State schools by allocating an additional $2 billion in education funding for the 2004 - 2005 school year.
In my position in the Capital Region, I see the resources available to some of our wealthiest and most advanced schools. I also see the abysmal lack of resources in some of our poorest and weakest schools. I see school administrators who recognize the need for access to learning materials for all students and I see school leaders who fail to recognize the value of a shared collection of up-to-date resources. The Appellate Court specifically included libraries as one of the significant "Instrumentalities of Learning". The underlying basic concept of a library is that a shared collection of resources benefits everyone in the learning community. All students, teachers and administrators have access to library resources.
No school can have everything but all schools need a strong
basic collection of educational resources. Teachers need tools with which
to teach. Books, atlases, videos, maps, documents, periodicals, online
databases all should be available in a shared centralized collection -
which is a well-stocked school library. The current cost of a book for
a school library is now $19.18. (Source of information: www.slj.com)
The State of New York currently provides $6 per child to purchase library
materials. This means that three or more children must share that new
book. In many schools, no local funding supplements that money.
In addition to print resources, school libraries are increasingly moving
toward the use of electronic information technology to work with students.
School library programs must have an infrastructure, up-to-date technology,
computers, projectors etc. in order to teach our students to manage the
world of electronic information. Students who enter college from a school
with a well-funded and well-staffed library have a great advantage over
those whose school library program was unable to prepare them for the
world of information needed in higher education. Media specialists in
our best schools teach students to access and evaluate the overabundance
of information they find online. They teach students to use information
in an ethical manner. They are responsible for the information literacy
curriculum in their schools.
Librarians in all types of libraries including schools
see the concept of the library in a much broader view, which is where
support for School Library Systems is crucial. Mechanisms for sharing
have been developed over time such that school libraries now borrow materials
from libraries all over the country for their students. Eight copies of
Jennifer Armstrong's book "Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World"
were recently sent from one school to another so that a teacher would
have enough copies to work with her students as they explored the adventures
of Ernest Shackleton. Earlier, a high school senior studying the Tuskegee
Syphilis Experiment received primary source documents and books from a
library in Alabama.
Transactions like these happen every day through School Library Systems
statewide. We view all libraries as part of a vast network of resources
available to our students and faculties.
The School Library Systems are a part of Education Law 282-284. Their governance and funding are spelled out in Commissioner's Regulations 90.18. Although we are all educators, we are funded under Aide to Municipalities (Chapter 917).
Unfortunately, the School Library Systems have not had funding increased since 1992. Many of these resource-sharing systems in our state are about to go under financially. They do not have funds to pay their small staff or even to buy envelopes. Miraculously, many of our School Library Systems continue to do an incredible job with the few resources they have. They continue to make interlibrary loan work. Why? The people who administer these programs are librarians. Their mission is to get information to users, students or teachers. You would be amazed at the informal and low cost devices they have come up with to continue their program. Rubber bands and envelopes get used and reused. A book needed by a student in one school is transported to a day care center by the lending librarian where it is handed off to a secretary (also a child's mom) and brought to the student the following morning. School librarians get information to kids any way they can.
Why re-invent the wheel? Why not support the infrastructure that is already in place? Increased funding for School Library Systems will allow students and teachers to continued access to the vast resources of libraries all across the state.
I would remind you once more that school libraries are funded through school district funding. School Library Systems, however, are funded through Aid to Municipalities and are part of a different funding stream. School library media specialists and School Library Systems support the Alliance for Quality Education in its quest to boost school funding immediately and to revise the funding formula so that all students have access to a quality education.
With the appropriate support, school libraries and School Library Systems will be a part of the solution to the dilemma of inequity in education in New York State.
Respectfully submitted:
Linda Fox
Director, Capital Region School Library System
900 Watervliet-Shaker Road
Albany, NY 12205
(518) 464-5104 (phone)
(518) 464-5101 (fax)
lfox@gw.neric.org